Town council is embarking on a monumental task by attempting to create a community master plan in the next five months. The plan will dictate the future of this town for the next three to five years. Worrisome is the fact that the mayor is telling us the master plan will need to be done in tandem with the town’s 2008 budget process to help council direct taxpayer dollars.

It is worrisome because if the master plan is done haphazardly, many community groups will get left out. The plan could simply reflect the need by some of our representatives to leave a legacy before they go into another election, and then it will simply amount to a competition about who can speak the longest and loudest.

If council plans on pushing such an important visioning process through to be completed by April, how will it get input from seasonal residents and snowbirds who are not here during the winter months? They too make up an important part of this community.

This visioning process is starting to smell of preconceived notions, or a process to pay lip service, rather than an earnest look at how this community sees itself evolving into the future.

The demands on the timelines ought to be sounding warning bells. A consultant is just being hired and council wants an interim report in mid-February. That doesn’t leave members of this community much time to truly digest where council plans on spending when it comes to big-ticket items.

What’s the hurry? Why can’t council plan its 2008 budget according to the service the municipality has been entrusted to provide and formulate a community visioning process with ample time for community consultation?

This council is starting to seem more like a junta trying to pass its own agenda while it rides the municipal purse strings by the seat of its pants. If community consultation is truly important, and it ought to be, then council should not just pay it lip service. It should take the time to do it right.

T.d.V.